The Miracle Tree.
on Mary In Cambodia (Cambodia), 27/Nov/2009 07:13, 34 days ago
The Miracle Tree.This is Ferdie. He told me all about the fruit he grows on his farm.Coconuts grow on coconut palm trees. The young fruit are harvested when they are about the size of a football. There are up to 20 coconuts on one stem and they are green. The centre contains juice, you chop the top off, put in a straw and drink it. It’s a tasty refreshing drink. The flesh can be grated and then squeezed to give coconut milk. Then the flesh is soaked in water, this mixture is sieved to give a thinner milky fluid used in making curry..The flesh is also put into curry. The brown hairy nuts that we get in the west are old fruit that are left on the tree until they fall. In Asia these are mainly used to make coconut oil, soap and face creams. Look at the ingredients on your soap, if you see the word ‘laurel’ it contains coconut. It is also used in many ointments and medicines and is rich in vitamin E. To get the oil yousimmer the milk over a low heat for a few hours, the oil comes to the top and is then skimmed off. The husk is used for making rope and mattresses. The hard shell is good as fire wood, and any bits still left go into animal food. The kernel (inside white part) is sometimes scraped out and used in cooking. The dried kernel is called copra In the Philippines the oil is rubbed on the skin to cure all sorts of ailments, it is also used as fuel and as lamp oil in homes and temples The leaves can be burned and the ash mixed with the oil, it’s then left for 48 hours to harden and you have soap towash yourself and your clothes. The leaves are also woven and plaited to roof houses and as fences. Is it any wonder the people in the Philippine Islands call it ‘The Miracle Tree’? A person can survive on coconut alone, it provides food, drink, ointment, medicine, soap, oil, fire wood, a softbed, a roof over your head and animal food. Scraping out the kernel for desert.